Almost Seventeen
by EOlivet
Summary: At 17 almost three times over, she was his first pretty girl.


Disclaimer: The characters described herein are the property of Hank Steinberg, Warner Brothers Domestic Television Distribution and CBS. No copyright infringement is intended.  
  
Timeline: Pre-Pilot, pre-affair.  
  
Rating: TV-14. Jack and Samantha pairing.  
  
A/N: Many thanks to S -- without her constant encouragement, I would not have posted this. Thanks as always to D and MSt, whose enthusiasm is so appreciated.  
  
***  
  
Almost Seventeen  
  
***  
  
The key turned, the door opened and suddenly, he was 17 again.  
  
He'd always felt like he skipped 17. Gone from 16 to 18 -- kid to adult. The little boy had become a grownup overnight, and there was no time to be a teenager.  
  
No time to enjoy that feeling of hope because you were young, but not too young. That feeling of superiority -- because you were still enjoying the comforts of home, but were aware enough to assert your independence. That feeling of power, because you knew everything now, and your life hadn't even really started.  
  
Seventeen meant football games, school functions and...impressing pretty girls. Exchanging shy smiles across the room. Staring too long at each other in the hallway. An arm around your waist, a hand on your shoulder. First love -- lust in its most innocent form.  
  
As the door closed behind him, he tried to take in where she lived -- make some polite, socially acceptable comment -- but he was too taken with the woman not quite on his arm who was now moving away from his side.  
  
"Sit down wherever," she gestured, aimlessly -- turning to address him.  
  
The polite, socially acceptable thing would be to comply, but instead he just stared at her for too long in her own apartment. Shy smiles in a room with only a few feet separating them. Innocent lust wasn't anything close to what he thought he might feel for her, but she had, no doubt, at one point been someone else's first love. Still, after being 17 nearly three times over, she was his first pretty girl.  
  
Gingerly setting the folders on her coffee table, he removed his coat. They were here to do work. That was why she'd asked him over in the first place. Going through applications for a new position on the team. He'd asked Vivian to do the same thing, and he fully intended going over his other colleague's choices in person as well. Just not on the same night...in her apartment...  
  
"Heading out?" he'd asked Samantha, when she'd poked her head into his office.  
  
Nodding, she leaned lightly against the door, and stifled a yawn.  
  
"Long day," he commented.  
  
She covered her mouth, shutting her eyes briefly. "And it goes on..."  
  
At this, he raised his eyebrows. "Hot date?" Trying to keep the sarcasm out of his voice.  
  
He received a slight smile in return. "Yeah, at my apartment -- with the giant pile of applications you wanted me to review."  
  
Smirking, he turned his attention back to the work on his desk. "Sounds fun."  
  
"Yeah, you should come along," she joked.  
  
Without thinking, he accepted her offhanded, perhaps completely unintentional invitation with a deliberate, intentional, "OK."  
  
Surprise turned to confusion turned to...a shy kind of warmth. "OK," she affirmed, softly -- meeting his eyes as if to make sure...  
  
He should've been home with his family. That was how he'd spent 17 the first time. The second time was with _his_ first love -- a grownup love with no innocence involved. Only now, approaching 17 for the third time, did he realize what he had missed.  
  
As she took a seat on the couch, he hesitated before choosing a chair to her right.  
  
"You thirsty or...?" She indicated the kitchen.  
  
"No," he replied, shaking his head.  
  
He could drink coffee with her at any time, but he didn't think that was why she'd invited him here. He'd accepted because it was an excuse to see her outside of work -- because somewhere, somehow seeing her every day was no longer enough. Then he wondered how he'd started "seeing" Samantha Spade.  
  
Opening a folder, he snuck a glance at her. His heart beat faster because on this night, he was 17 and completely enamored with this pretty girl who'd invited him over to "study."  
  
They fell into working together, addressing the papers and folders instead of each other -- both knowing if one happened to look up, conversation would inevitably -- and suddenly -- stop.  
  
As the night wore on, the pile of folders divided into two piles -- spurred on by coffee he eventually did accept from her. When she got back with the mugs, he had moved to the couch a respectable distance from where she had been sitting.  
  
Depositing the mugs in front of them, she rubbed the back of her neck.  
  
"You OK?" he asked, quietly.  
  
She nodded, managing a soft "Mmm-hmm."  
  
But she was wincing as she spoke, obviously in pain. Her hand kept moving under her hair, as she tried not to contort her features, which would reveal her plight.  
  
"We can stop," he offered, before remembering a better, worse option. "I...I could go..."  
  
Her head shook back and forth. "No, it's OK -- I just..." Her nose wrinkled. "I just get this way sometimes...sitting in the same position for- -"  
  
His hands had moved while she was speaking -- resting upon her shoulders. Fingers closing over the tightness in her muscles, his thumbs worked lazy, wide circles around the top of her spine.  
  
"Oh..." An involuntary sound -- hovering dangerously close to a groan.  
  
He closed his eyes against it, thankful that her back was turned at the moment. His palms slid off her shoulders, prodding her shoulder blades.  
  
Air rushed out through her clenched teeth, and she shifted on the couch so that her back was facing him completely. As she tucked her stocking feet under her, they brushed against his legs -- shoes long since discarded.  
  
Slipping further, his hands traveled along her sides -- preserving her modesty as they roved across her back -- kneading at the stress of the day and night. Trying to feel the knots...the tension, and not the warmth of her skin seeping through the thin sweater. Not the desire that accompanied the heat, compelling his fingers to slow their movement until he was almost making love to her with his hands.  
  
"Jack...ahh..." she breathed heavily, which did nothing to dispel that notion.  
  
Lower and lower...closer and closer, until his legs were flush with her feet. He could feel his own breathing start to slow and thicken, and he vainly tried to refocus on the task, and not on the sensation it was creating.  
  
But his fingers soon made their way to her waist -- just inches above where her sweater ended. A few inches lower, and the pretense of a massage would disappear completely. A few inches, and a slight shift towards her, and he'd discover if her skin was as soft as he hoped or imagined.  
  
His heart seemed to beat in time with her breathing -- erratic...shaky...rapid...slowed. Hands easing their pressure so he was simply caressing her back -- adding rather than alleviating tension. With an exhale that sounded more like a last gasp of air, she turned around.  
  
Her cheeks were flushed, her eyes darkened, her knees pressed to his legs. She'd taken all the knots in her back and put them into his stomach.  
  
But before he could speak, her hands had grabbed the back of his shoulders, forcing him to turn a little ways from her.  
  
Her fingers worked valiantly through his suit jacket, but he wasn't even registering their physical effect anymore because it was no longer her fingers that he was craving.  
  
He wanted to kiss her. Again.  
  
He'd kissed her before, and maybe that was the problem. It was easy to cross the line once -- write it off as an impulse or a moment of weakness. Sorrow, comfort...passion that went a little too far -- for he was fairly certain no boss soothed his subordinate with an open-mouthed kiss.  
  
Those hands kept working, but he didn't want her hands -- he wanted her mouth and her skin because on this night, he was 17, and lines were made to be crossed.  
  
Whirling around, he caught her lips in a flurry fueled by desire and not-so- innocent lust. The mouth he had sought opened easily, the hands on his shoulders infusing tension through her fingers, as they clutched and clawed at his back. They had been at this point once before -- and broken away from each other.  
  
But not tonight.  
  
His hands found the back of her neck, as her lips trailed down his. He tilted her chin up and reclaimed her mouth. Moving from her lips, journeying down her neck, his tongue explored the vee of her sweater. Her skin was hot and sweet, and he wanted more of it.  
  
Pushing them both down gently across the couch, he found her back again -- pulling her ever closer. Once again, his hands located her sweater's hem with a 17-year-old exuberance.  
  
Her body radiated so much heat that she seemed to sizzle -- or perhaps that was just the sound of her breath at his touch. A sharp gasp through her teeth that sounded like water against scorching metal. He certainly felt like he was melting against her -- his fingers rising and falling as the tempo of her breathing increased.  
  
Soon he had rediscovered the bottom of her sweater and, with a hesitation borne only of age, he guided his hand across her waist to lie flat against her stomach.  
  
This was 17. Sprawled on the couch in the arms of a pretty girl with sweet lips and warm skin, who allowed you access under her sweater...higher...higher...testing the limits, seeing how far he could--  
  
His hand froze, perilously close to the point of no return.  
  
He wasn't 17. He was nowhere near 17. At 17, the pretty girls were so- called nice girls, and they never let you go too far. But he was an adult, and she was an adult, and she was encouraging rather than stopping him because too far didn't exist.  
  
At 17, you tested the modesty of nice girls -- secretly glad that they never let you get too far, because you _were_ 17, and it was simply pure, innocent lust.  
  
Once that line was crossed, there was nothing to prevent him from leaping over all the ones that remained. Nothing to stop him from making love to her for the first time right there on this couch, amidst folders and papers, coffee mugs and study dates and feelings that went too far beyond the innocent lust of 17.  
  
Besides, he'd already gone too far just by being there.  
  
Sighing, he removed his hand and slowed their kissing to a stop. She took several stabilizing breaths before opening her eyes to meet his -- and at that moment, he knew someday all the lines in the world would never prevent him from intimately knowing her.  
  
But not tonight.  
  
Because tonight, he was 17 -- and 17-year-olds had curfews, obligations and responsibilities to their family.  
  
Their family...  
  
The thought was almost enough to propel him out the door, but instead, he rose to sit on the couch as she drew herself up beside him.  
  
Family meant something different now. It had become much more complicated at 17 almost three times over.  
  
He removed a folder from the untouched pile and handed it to her. The brightness of Samantha's eyes tugged at his heart, and he gazed back at her, marveling at how pretty girls became beautiful, how innocent lust grew into something far more potent and how tonight, he was very grateful not to be 17.  
  
The End. 


End file.
